Month: October 2018

The FBI’s renewed investigation into multiple allegations of sexual misconduct by Brett Kavanaugh is not good news for him, or for Donald Trump.

The foremost danger for them, of course, is that FBI agents will quickly and easily find evidence that supports the allegations — or that confirms Kavanaugh’s alter ego as a lying, abusive drunk, hints of which we saw when he lost control in front of a Senate panel on Thursday.

But even if the investigation has been so neutered by the White House counsel as to foreordain a coverup, it gives those who see Kavanaugh’s nomination to the Supreme Court as an affront to core American values a great gift: Time.

Looking at the multitude of ways in which the Trump presidency is profoundly not normal, a consistent factor is how quickly we lurch from drama to drama, without a moment’s peace. The public and the press can barely keep track of the crises, not to mention process them, react to them, prevent them, or think about how to repair them.

That’s the pace we were going at again on Friday — until Senator Jeff Flake was finally persuaded to call for a few days’ delay.

And they can examine a very helpful graph created by Alvin Chang at Vox. It uses bright colors to chart the comparative responsiveness of the two witnesses. Where they answered directly, the graph showed blue; where they dodged a question or refused to answer, it showed magenta. Ford’s chart is a sea of blue; Kavanaugh’s is replete with evasive magenta.

But there’s another, maybe even more important reality that should and could sink in with a little more time: how Kavanaugh’s red-faced, venomous partisan outburst on Thursday – calling the allegations “a calculated and orchestrated political hit… on behalf of the Clintons” – renders him unfit for a leading role in a judicial branch that is supposed to be beyond partisan politics.

Now, obviously the Supreme Court is riven with politics, with four of its members already representing extremist right-wing views of the Constitution and social justice. But its members collegially avoid declaring their party loyalties, rather than get spitting mad about them. The appearance of a judicial system that is blind to bias is imperative for our democracy, even if the reality falls a bit short.

And don’t underestimate the value of a blistering, hysterically funny Saturday Night Live sketch (11 million views and counting on YouTube alone) in affecting popular discourse. Normally, Trump outrages have come and gone before SNL is able to mock them.

Finally, although the Kavanaugh nomination initially brought together almost everyone under the conservative tent including the never-Trumpers, the next few days will give that coalition more time to fray, and might give the tiny handful of allegedly non-Trump-lickspittle Republican senators a chance to find some way to vote no.

Because it’s no longer just a matter of Trump putting a lasting conservative imprint on the Supreme Court.

It’s now a matter of putting a Trump imprint on the Supreme Court – the imprint of misogyny, rage, white-male victimization, loss of control, and manifest unfitness for the job. And that imprint, placed by the Republican Party that has many elections in its future, would last a lifetime.

Donald Trump has smashed presidential precedents left and right -– almost exclusively to the benefit of the right.

The uppermost current example, of course, is his backing of an unhinged apparent sexual predator who would use a lifetime appointment to the Supreme Court to fight for white patriarchy and unlimited executive power.

But the trade agreement Trump announced today includes some concessions to the labor movement that Barack Obama, George W. Bush and Bill Clinton — reflecting the globalist consensus long embraced by the bipartisan elite in Washington – saw as utterly anachronistic.

It also reflects a rejection of the deeply held view among previous presidents from both parties that the unfettered flow of capital and goods serves U.S. interests – despite the ample evidence that it favors giant multinational corporations and investors over American workers.

“Without tariffs, we wouldn’t be standing here,” Trump said Monday morning. And although he doesn’t seem to understand how tariffs actually work, he was probably right.

It’s too early to conclude anything with great certainty – the final text is only now being closely examined by third parties, and it’s likely there are all sorts of pro-corporate surprises to come, especially when it comes to patents and intellectual property.

But starting in 2020, the new deal would require “a car or truck must have 75 percent of its components manufactured in Canada, Mexico or the United States, a substantial boost from the current 62.5 percent requirement,” the Washington Post reports. “There’s also a new rule that a significant percentage of the work done on the car must be completed by workers earning at least $16 an hour, or about three times what the typical Mexican autoworker makes.”

Lori Wallach, the director of Public Citizen’s Trade Watch, and the dean of the anti-globalization/anti-free-trade activists, issued a statement that I’m pretty sure was more favorable than any she’s issued in my lifetime. “The new deal includes some important improvements for which we have long advocated, some new terms we oppose and more work required to stop NAFTA’s ongoing job outsourcing, downward pressure on our wages and environmental damage,” she said.

She called out “important progress… with the removal of investment terms that help outsource jobs and a dramatic reining-in of NAFTA’s outrageous corporate Investor State Dispute Settlement tribunals under which corporations have grabbed hundreds of millions from taxpayers after attacks on environmental and health policies.”

The Wall Street Journal reported that Trump’s new strategy “seeks to win over labor unions long opposed to free-trade pacts, while maintaining support from business groups that have generally supported them.”

And Teamsters leader Jim Hoffa said in a statement that the union was “pleased” by the new agreement, noting “with approval the considerable progress on workers’ rights.” He said new labor requirements “contain obligations and protections that are superior to the original NAFTA, and also to the Trans-Pacific Partnership.”